Not The End
by She's a Star
Summary: 'At least it was raining...pouring with reckless abandon, and Ron Weasley was grateful for that fact. Tonight it was raining. And tonight, he would probably die.'


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Not The End

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by She's a Star

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Disclaimer: Harry Potter is mine. Yup. All mine.

...Not.

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Author's Note: Heheh...last night I had a dream semi-like this, and I felt compelled to write it. :)

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At least it was raining.

Not just sprinkling tiny little crystalline droplets, either. It was _really_ raining; pouring with reckless abandon, and Ron Weasley was grateful for the fact. If it had been a beautiful evening with a warm breeze in the air as the sun painted the sky deep reds and oranges in its setting, he would have been _severely_ pissed off.

Tonight it was raining.

And tonight he would probably die.

The trio walked silently, and he felt comforted each time Harry accidentally stepped on his toe or Hermione's arm brushed lightly against his. They were his best friends, two of the most important people in his life, and if he had to do this with anyone, he wanted it to be them.

He could see the house looming in the distance, dark and impressive in a sort of morbid sense. Tiny pinpricks of warm orangy light leaked from the windows, contrasting against the misty darkness of the night. He didn't want to go inside that house, didn't want his life to end. Ron Weasley wasn't destined to be the hero of their final adventure - that title belonged to Harry, and he was all right with it. It was oddly calming to possess the knowledge that one of the Death Eaters would merely utter '_Avada Kedavra!'_, a flash of green light would spill his way, and that would be that.

Harry was the boy who lived, and he would _stay_ the boy who lived if Ron had to die for it. His best friend was going to amount to great things, he knew that...it was Harry Potter's destiny.

Ron's was to fade into the background.

And so he stared, with quiet resolve, at the Riddle House.

"All right," Harry said very softly, his voice breaking the silence. Before then, the only sound had been the rain, pounding to the ground with a strange sort of cold beauty. 

"All right," Harry repeated, a bit louder this time. "Ron and I are going into the house. We've got to face him. Hermione, you go back to Hogwarts right away - you've _got_ to force Professor Dumbledore not to come for us. Keep him at Hogwarts, Hermione. Everything will be destroyed if he leaves."

Hermione nodded, a bit shaky but determined.

It fell quiet once more, and Ron said, with a weak smile, "Well, I guess this is where we say our good-byes, then."

"Yeah, I suppose," Harry said, a bit sadly.

A silence lingered among them for a moment before Hermione, without any warning, flung her arms around Harry. She kissed his cheek, and Ron felt a flicker of jealousy that he knew was petty and wrong at a time like this. Feeling a bit awkward, he watched as she stared up into Harry's eyes.

"You're going to be all right," she said, very firmly, though her voice shook. "You're going to be wonderful. Harry, I _know_ you can defeat him. It's your destiny; it's what you were born to do."

Harry was quiet for a moment - he studied her intensely through narrowed eyes, as though he couldn't quite believe her words. He hugged her tightly for a moment before gently lifting her arms from his shoulders. "Goodbye, Hermione."

Ron watched as she blinked back tears, and was struck with a strange sense of pride at how strong she was. She was handling it so well...simply saying goodbye to her best friend without knowing if she'd ever see him again.

And then she'd turned to him.

"Ron," she whispered, tears glistening in her honey colored eyes. Her normally bushy brown hair was soaked and fell limply past her shoulders, and he couldn't help but think how amazingly beautiful she was.

"Hermione," he responded simply; he could feel tears welling up in his own eyes. 

And they simply stared at one another, and it seemed as though his heart were being viciously ripped into pieces. And he knew that he couldn't go with Harry, couldn't go into that house and attempt to defeat the Dark Lord. He couldn't move from this spot; he couldn't leave her.

He wanted forever with her, and yet this could be their last instant.

"Ron," Harry said, very gently. "I'm going to walk ahead a bit - see if they have anyone on lookout there. You catch up to me, all right?"

Ron sent Harry a look of gratitude. "I'll catch up."

"Bye Hermione," Harry said, very calmly, before disappearing into rain and darkness.

Ron wanted to go over and wrap his arms around her, to kiss her, to whisper to her that he'd loved her for so long and never truly realized it until this very moment. 

And yet they both didn't move, standing agonizingly far away from one another.

"Hermione," he said again, loving her name as it rolled off his tongue and into the night and the dark and the rain.

A dam seemed to break inside of her at this, and before he knew it, she'd flung herself into his arms. He felt a sense of completeness, and suddenly all his fear seemed to fade away into nothingness. There was only Hermione, only himself, only this embrace in the rain and this feeling of being so completely and utterly in love with someone that it was nearly maddening.

"Oh, Ron," she said, her voice trembling horribly, and he knew that she was sobbing. "Ron Weasley, don't do something rash and foolish and get yourself killed. Ron Weasley, you'd better come back to me."

He felt a tear trickle down his cheek, and suddenly felt very thankful for the rain that camouflaged it. 

"Don't worry," he said softly, running his hand through her soaked hair, "Don't worry. I'll come back." He forced a weak laugh. "You weren't this emotional around Harry."

She looked up at him, sniffling, and said, quite impatiently, "You're so stupid sometimes, you know that?"

He blinked. "Um..."

"I have been _so_ head-over-heels in love with you for years, and you have yet to notice," she continued; he thought he saw her cheeks flushing, but couldn't quite tell in the darkness. "I just...Ron, you have to come back."

A strange sort of euphoric happiness seemed to explode through him, and he gently raised her chin with shaking fingers. Their gazes locked, and he mumbled, a bit sheepishly, "You know, that's quite a coincidence, as I've been head-over-heels in love with you for years, too."

Overjoyed laughter spilled from her lips, and she said, quite brightly, "Well, how about that."

And then, somehow, their lips had touched. Fireworks seemed to erupt around them, and the purest bliss that Ron had ever experienced seemed to envelop them. And in that instant, he _knew _that this was where he was always meant to be - he felt whole, complete...The rest of his life, his life before he'd kissed her, seemed empty and dismal and purely unlived. Somehow, strangely, he knew that if he stepped into that house and never walked out again, it would all be all right, because he'd kissed her, and he'd experienced perfection, and he'd truly lived.

He still tasted her kiss even after they'd pulled away - the sweetest of memories seemed permanently fixed into his mind as he stared at her. 

"You're coming back," she said, faintly, weakly, as though trying to convince herself of it.

"I'm coming back," he assured her in a stronger voice. 

She smiled, taking his hands in her own and entwining her fingers with his. The two of them simultaneously glanced toward the house, unwilling, and at once the smile flickered and died.

He never wanted her to stop smiling.

With a deep breath, he informed her, "I'm going to marry you someday."

The smile was back, playing around the corners of her lips. 

"Oh really?" she asked wryly.

He nodded, a bit weakly. "I'll come back."

She paused for a moment, studied him, then said in the softest of whispers, "I know."

Very slowly, their fingers unlaced and he took a few steps away from her. Every step he took seemed to pain him more - the rain seemed to grow more cold, the future more bleak. He wanted to stay with her; to kiss her and bicker with her. Hell, he'd even like one of their blazing rows that ended in months of the silent treatment. 

Anything but goodbye.

He took a deep, shaky breath and turned away from her, walking slowly toward a fate he didn't want. 

And then her voice cut through the night, soft and sweet and utterly scared all at once.

"I love you."

Those three words, those three beautiful words in her beautiful voice seemed to reassure him. He would go, he would help his best friend, they would save the wizarding world, he would come home, and, Goddammit, he'd kiss her again!

And again. And again.

"I love you too," he responded, and there was a smile in his voice.

And Ron Weasley stepped bravely toward his fate, knowing that this wasn't the end. 

His life was just beginning.


End file.
